I'm stuck at the city gate puzzle. (This is not a puzzle question). I can use the circular wheel to obtain 5-4-8-1, but instead of a cursor arrow I keep getting an eyeball, which will not allow me to reposition any of the slides or springs to put the numbered balls into position. The eyeball repeated posts the message "There's a ball with a number 5 that goes right here".
Since there's no Skip option for this puzzle I can't progress further in the game. Suggestions?

Ok, I see what the problem is. It's a glitch with the puzzle. Even though I'd never picked up the #5 ball, it kept appearing in the puzzle, but wouldn't let me proceed. I found it near the gate lock, put it in the puzzle, and it let me finish it. Very weird. On I go...

susielee wrote:I would love to purchase the game, but, it's soooo SLOW. It's like everything is in slow motion. That takes all the enjoyment out of it. Don't usually have this problem.

I have this problem too!
I have learned some things that will help; if you change your color qualities setting to 16 bit and if you move your hardware acceleration down a couple of notches. Then a few things still move slow in ERS games but it's MUCH better and I can get through them. I used this for the most recent version of Puppet Show and the Werewolf game from ERS and Grim Facade: Mystery of Venice I hope it will work on this one as well.
You can access these setting by right clicking on a blank spot on your desktop and choosing "properties" then the "Settings" tab, then you click on "Advanced" for the hardware acceleration level
Hope it works for you!

susielee wrote:I would love to purchase the game, but, it's soooo SLOW. It's like everything is in slow motion. That takes all the enjoyment out of it. Don't usually have this problem.

I have the same issue with my computer and ERS games. I have tried updating my video card drivers and graphics software but it never seems to make a difference. I love the games but am very frustrated by how slow everything moves. When I downloaded the free trial, I only got as far as the bridge to town! What should have taken 10 minutes tops took the whole 60 minutes! Don't know what else I can do.

Same problem other people have mentioned and the same problem I've been having with most ERS games: verrrrry slow, or freezes. No problem with most other developers' games, but ERS has become totally problematic.

There seems to be a problem with the build of the game, or maybe it's just my computer. First, the game shut down automatically during the trial, so I had to restart it again. Everything was going more or less fine, until I got to the scene with Julien. Whenever he was talking, there were some flashes showing where his mouth is. Although it's a minor thing, it's quite distracting, as it seems to show part of the background of the game.

Anyway, I'll wait to see if they fix the problems, otherwise, as much as I hate to do that, I will have to pass up the CE and wait for the SE.

Opened the mailbox and got the gate code for the city gate ... but then wandered around for about an hour trying to figure out what I'd missed (I was unable to use any inventory items). Finally checked the walkthrough (which really bugs me, because I like to get through a game without any hints) and I see that the last HOS game I finished was supposed to provide a snow flake and stained glass window piece (was also supposed to place two heart pieces together?) ... was unable to do do/obtain any of this and I'm certain I've completed all HOS up to this point. Advice?

Thanks for this advice, I have seen it at the help page as well (error 126, which recommends to do updates for DirectX), but it does normally not help me as my PC does not update the latest DirectX version. Thus certain games I can not play on the old PC and I am not using my Mac for this. This time I was lucky and could play after I deleted the game and DL it again.

For the fishies that are experiencing problems picking up the letter "P" in the hidden object scene:

Use the lighter on the candle (to the right, on top of the coffin). Then, grab the candle and place it on the spider web with the acorn in the upper left corner.

Afterwards, you should be able to click on the letter "P".

When I played this HOS, it would only let me pick up the letter "P" after burning down the spiderweb.

sandr1, I'm glad to hear you got the game working after downloading it again, I hope you're enjoying it!

Oaktown1, the HOS in this game seem to have random objects, which means that only the "storyline" items in a HOS are the same, the rest of the objects may vary.
You could double check the walkthrough to see if there's a chance any HOS was missed or see if the Hint button can help direct you towards the right direction.

As for fishies with performance issues, if you haven't already, I'd recommend giving the steps in the below help article a go:

I can't get past the tangrams game in the crypt. The pieces are fine for the first game, but the long piece with one square end and a sloping end is sloping the wrong way for the second puzzle. I finally checked the SG because I couldn't get it to work, and the piece needs to be flipped for the game. I have contacted CS to see what they can do. I have played the game twice up to that point with the same result.

I went to try the game did not even get 15 minutes in it and a hint scene went black. so i hit everwhere an got though that and screen went half white then the art work was breaking up .yep its a bug. big fish needs to fix game. edgar allan poes game never had problems with this one is a bug. please fix so I can buy.

WARNING.. Windows 7 systems may not work with this game and caused mine serious system crashes...

.. and seems I'm not the only one who had crash problems with this game though don't know what system they all have..
and seems crashes occur at similar same approximate 15-20 minutes into playing.. unfortunately past the time I normally had to play a trial to know if a potential problem for my system..

tried once more before uninstalling with trying another compatibility but once again it crashed my system.. though earlier at less than 5 minutes into playing..

After cleaning up my machine and it seeming to be now running fine, I came in here and began reading for possible tech problems solutions but seems thus far the problem not really yet identified nor real solutions..

from reading other posts here.. seems the game actually may have numerous bugs....
will check in here again in a few days to see what other and BF is saying about the causes before I contact their techs...